Geniza Lab

Note with financial content. In Arabic script. 16 full and 4 half lines on paper. Fiscal hand, curvilinear lines and some words are stacked at the end. Perhaps the document was written by a lower official. Contains: basmala; al-'abd; and mentions "al-khassa" a financial account and "man talaba dhalika min," both towards the end of the document. Many numbers and the verb "addada" (x2) in the middle section.

Accounts, or maybe just arithmetic. In Arabic script and Greek/Coptic(?) numerals. There are two leaves of this document, following 5 leaves of a literary text by Saadya Ga'on.

Tax receipt for jawālī with registration marks.

State document that begins "waṣala ilā bayt al-māl al-maʿmūr."

Letter fragment, or maybe drafts/formularies. In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic. Almost the entirety of what is preserved consists of flattery and blessings.

Bifolium with copies of letters. In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic.

Account of the Qodesh: revenue from rent, ca.1040. The upper part of a leaf, writtten by Yefet b. David b. Shekhanya. (Information from Gil, Documents, pp. 181 #14)

Payroll [similar to T-S K15.9] in the hand of Shelomo b. Eliyyahu, for the seventh and eighth weeks of the liturgical calendar. Mostly same names and sums as that list. The entries for the eighth week are in Arabic script. Some payments of arrears from the sixth week are also noted. This is a full report. The numerals are not defined. In the first 15 lines they represent dirhams, in the remaining 20, loaves of bread. Another difficulty: Here, bread costs 32 dirhams (and the distribution is 126 pounds = loaves); elsewhere, about 10 pounds cost about 1 dirham (150 pounds of bread cost 15 d. in App. B 42 and 13 1/3 in App. B 47). Goitein's solution: 'There still were two distributions every week, on Tuesdays and Fridays, as had been the practice a hundred and more years before. Our list notes the number of loaves allocated to each household for one distribution (habitual in all lists of the poor), but registers the total spent on bread during one week (by the distributor concerned). The comparatively rare occurrence of the item '2 loaves for one person' catches the eye, especially if compared with the lists from the early eleventh and twelfth centuries.' (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, pp. 450-451, App. B 41 [dated 1210-1225])

Long account in Judaeo-Arabic. Of persons to whom pitch (zift) was sold, headed by a general (al-qāʾid Abū Tamīm), the representative of an amir (Yūḥannas wakīl al-amīr), and a government secretary (Abū l-ʿAlāʾ al-kātib). Further down there is a soldier (al-jundī). Obviously(?) all buyers had taken the commodity on credit. Ends with a note about the amount remaining with the broker. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.)

Large list of contributors paying 2 dinars (two people), 1 dinar, 1/2 dinar, 1/4 dinar, 1/6 dinar, or 1/8 dinar. Headed by Abū l-Mufaḍḍal, like T-S NS J288 and 403. Dating: ca. 1100 CE. Information from Goitein's index card. See Med Soc II, Appendix C, #19.

Detailed account of monthly sales of products from the east in Sicily, especially spices and flax, covering the period from August 1064 to October 1065, written in late 1065 (Gil). Also contains the draft of a letter, in which Ibn al-Shāma requests from his business partner a similar account for the years 454–57/1062–65 of the goods and gold that had been sent in exchange from Sicily to Egypt. This exchange of accounts suggests that this particular business relationship that had lasted several years was hereby ended. According to Gil, the account and the letter were sent by Zakharya b. Yaʿqūb b. al-Shāma in Tripoli, Libya. Also mentions Abū Zikrī Ḥayyim b. ʿAmmār, the representative of the merchants in Palermo; and refers to a load of merchandise belonging to Yūsuf b. Ibrāhīm the dayyān transported by Abū ʿAbdallah (b. al-Baʿbāʿ). (Information from Mediterranean Society, I, pp. 185, 207; Gil, Kingdom, vol. 4, p. 222; Ben-Sasson, Yehudei Sitzilya, p. 330)

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Lists many names, including Musallam/Muslim Ibn al-Qābila ('son of the midwife').

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Mentions Nahray b. Nissim and Yūsuf b. al-Ghazzāl.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Rudimentary handwriting. The word ṣaḥḥa appears between many of the lines.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Each of the three entries is a neighborhood in or around Fustat: al-Jazīra (ʿinda Bū Isḥāq, 2), Ḥabs Bunān (ʿinda Bū l-Baqā', 2) and Sūq Wardān (ʿinda Bishr, 3)

Public letter in the hand of Avraham Maimonides (d. 1237 CE). The cantors of Fustat are instructed to read it aloud in the synagogue on Monday, Thursday, and Monday, as well as Saturday morning. A ban of excommunication is declared against the women who continue dyeing silk privately ('in the houses'), because the tax farmer who had the license for silk dyeing had complained to the dīwān that he was losing revenue. Information in part from Goitein's note card. The CUDL description identifies the hand as belonging to Joshua b. Abraham Maimonides (active 1310-1355 CE), but Amir Ashur, who wrote that description, has now revised his view and identifies this hand as belonging to Avraham (I) Maimonides.

List of recipients of charity (bread) along with the khuddām al-kanīs (the list begins with three parnasim). This list fills three pages of the bifolium. One page has a Hebrew poem, preceded by the glyph, possibly in the handwriting of Moshe b. Levi ha-Levi.

Accounts in Judaeo-Arabic. Mentions people including Barakāt al-Kohen, Sayyid al-Kull, al-Wazīr, Abū Sahl, Abū Saʿd Ibn Khalaf, Tamīm al-Aṭrūsh (the deaf). Goods include honey and pressed dates (ʿajwa).

Story in Judaeo-Arabic. In part about a trip to Jerusalem and people who erected idols. Someone has identified this as Sefer Yosippon on FGP.